This book really surprised me, it was so different from what I expected. I really had no frame of reference when I picked it up as to what it would be like, having never read any works by Bayard Taylor, not to mention the fact that this book is rather obscure. For the unavailability of hard copies o

Second Bayard Taylor short novel that I've read and like the writing style as well as the ahead of his time theology and social consciousness.

I hoped for more to develop between Joseph and Philip but neither fulfilment nor heartbreak between them came.

It's far more about Joseph and his friends' search for suitable matrimonial partners than it is about the relationship between Joseph and 'His Friend' from the title. The moral strictures o

Coming-of-age story, domestic drama, and courtroom drama in equal parts, this is really intriguing. The homoerotic friendship between Joseph and Philip -- consummated through caresses and kisses -- is the story's central romantic relationship. The book's other (heterosexual) romances are simply a fo

A twee relic of its time. Worth reading, however, for its status as America's first gay novel. Obliquely Whitmanian in its discussion of manly love--so straightforward enough to make the point, but not so straightforward as to patently offend the moral sensibilities of late-19th century American rea

For the first American gay book it had a hell of a lot of straight couples XD all the relationships were sexless (not unusual in old books) so it can be argued that the almost asexual nature of the relationship between Philip and Joseph can’t necessarily be faulted as Joseph’s relationship with his

This is really two books in one. Or maybe a behind-the-scenes novel about another novel. L.A. Fields adds background and context to Bayard Taylor’s novel that fleshes out the story of “America’s First Gay Novel”. And the novel needs it. It’s not a thrilling novel on its own, but it’s place in histor

Turn the flame down, the pot's aboilin'! I liked how the main character had no idea about what his feelings were for His Friend-made for an interesting read. But the homoeroticism is a secondary theme, just so you know...more

I read this to see what what's been called America's first same-sex novel sounded like, written as it was around 1870. The author, at the end, leaves a bit of plausible deniability, but the story is frank enough in other places to earn the title.

What's interesting is that this isn't just a story of